November 15, 2012

In-depth

Israel’s Message to Hamas Should Resonate in Washington

The attacks on Israel from Gaza shows the U.S. must take a hard look at its Mideast policies, writes Jonathan Tobin in Commentary.

…the conviction that Hamas had abandoned its primary purpose was always unfounded. The Islamist group’s ongoing war with Israel never ended. Though analysts will debate the motivation for the decision to launch a missile offensive on southern Israel, the result was unambiguous. The violence should derail any thought of the United Nations voting to upgrade the status of the increasingly irrelevant Palestinian Authority. 

 

Operation Cast Lead 2.0

The Gaza rocket attacks on Israel are part of an internal Hamas power struggle and the fallout could spiral beyond both sides' control, warns Hussein Ibish in Foreign Policy. 

The internal dynamic of Hamas has traditionally been that leaders in its Politburo, which is based almost entirely in neighboring Arab countries, were more militant than their compatriots inside Gaza. It was the leaders in exile who maintained close relations with the radical regimes in Iran and Syria, while the Hamas government in Gaza was more restrained because it had more to lose from violence with Israel. That calculation has been inverted in recent months as Hamas's foreign alliances have undergone a dramatic transformation and its domestic wing has made a bold attempt to assert its primacy.

Daily Digest

• Times of Israel: Three dead in rocket attack on Kiryat Malachi
• Haaretz: Israel killed its subcontractor in Gaza
• Jerusalem Post: The battle for the South has begun
• Ynet: IDF strikes over 100 Gaza targets
• New York Times: Israel’s Military Begins Social Media Offensive as Bombs Fall on Gaza
• Washington Post: Analysts fear wide-reaching fallout from Israeli strikes on Gaza
• Wall Street Journal: The Tide of War in Gaza

Follow Shmuel Rosner on Twitter and Facebook for facts and figures, analysis and opinion on Israel and the U.S., the Jewish World and the Middle East